Page 31 of Archer
“It has all the furniture and everything, right, Mom?”
“Wow, the furniture and everything?” She nodded her head vigorously, and I chuckled. “So what I want now is for us to take a picture with you making a pouty face. Do you know how to make one of those? Like how your face would look if instead of Gabby’s Dollhouse stuff, you open a gift, and it’s a bunch of Brussel sprouts.”
She laughed. “You’re so silly, Mr. Archer. Santa wouldn’t be mean and bring me yucky Brussel sprouts. I was good all year.”
“Of course you were, but can you show me what kind of face you’d make if he did?”
She made a face like something tasted horrible, and I couldn’t help but laugh. She wasn’t wrong. That was probably the face she’d make when faced with the green vegetable. I snapped a few shots because, seriously, it was adorable, even if it hadn’t been the intended look. Then I tried a different angle.
“Okay, let’s try again. What if he brought you new socks?” I paused for effect. “And not even cool, colorful socks with kittens on them, just plain white socks. What kind of face would you make now?”
She pooched out her lips in the most adorable pout ever. I snapped a few more pictures before she couldn’t fight it anymoreand burst out laughing. I got the shot I’d been hoping for, and I was sure they were going to come out perfect. Sometimes photo shoots with kids tested my patience, but Clara was either such a doll, or my mood was too good to let anything bring me down because today had actually been enjoyable.
When we were done, I walked them to the door of the studio and promised Amy that I’d get them all to her in a few days. I closed the door behind them and locked it before looking at my watch. I was doing pretty good on time. It was still a good hour before Crispin’s last class, so I had time to shower and get dinner going.
I went up to my condo, got cleaned up, then turned on some music and started pulling out the ingredients to make a classic stir fry. I’d always enjoyed cooking, but I’d fallen into the habit of grabbing something from one of the places in the building because it wasn’t much fun to cook for one. So even though stir fry wasn’t all that impressive, I was looking forward to cooking for him. Besides, if I had my way, I’d have plenty of opportunities in the future to wow him with my culinary skills.
I had the rice in the steamer and was cutting up some bell peppers when I heard a knock on the door. I put down the knife and went to greet Crispin.
“Sorry, I’m late. My class ran over.”
I stepped back to let him in. “It’s fine. I was just prepping vegetables while I waited on you to get here.”
“Can I help?”
I was tempted to tell him to go relax, that he’d just gotten off work and I had it, but he sounded so excited about the idea that I didn’t have the heart to tell him no.
“Sure, do you like to cook?”
“I do. I used to cook all the time when I had my own apartment, but now that I’m buying the studio, I normally get home too late to cook dinner.”
“Well, tonight you’re here, so let’s get to chopping. You can start on the broccoli.”
I got him a cutting board and a knife, and he got to work. We spent the next few minutes chopping up veggies while he told me about the class he’d just finished. It felt so natural to be here with him like this. I could so easily imagine our evenings like this, preparing dinner together while we talked about our day. I’d convinced myself my work was enough. That I liked living alone and didn’t need anything or anyone else, but in such a short amount of time, Crispin had turned that idea on its head.
When he’d finished with the broccoli, he grabbed an onion and went to work on it. I glanced over to see him cutting that onion like he knew what he was doing. “Your knife skills are pretty impressive.”
He laughed. “I used to watch a lot ofFood Network. My favorite is the one where the people are terrible at cooking, like worse than terrible. They’re actually horrible. One of the first things they work on is knife cuts.”
With him helping me, it didn’t take us long to get everything finished. “Do you want to eat at the bar or at the table?” I asked.
“I don’t know. I usually scarf down some food on the couch while I watch television.” He shrugged.
“Let’s reserve that for pizza nights, and tonight we can eat at the table.”
“Sounds good to me.”
He took the plates to the table, and I grabbed us both something to drink, then we both took our seats. As we ate, I told him about the people who’d been in to have their pictures taken.
“So this is a really busy time of year for you, huh?”
“Yeah, I mean, wedding season is worse, but this is more back-to-back every day.”
“It’s kind of funny because it’s the busiest for me, too. It gets colder outside, and more people are looking for things to do indoors to help stay fit, and a lot of them choose yoga.”
“That makes sense to me. Have you thought about bringing someone else in to teach some of the classes?” I asked.
“I have, but then I have to pay them, and that would cut into the studios’ profits.”